


The Four Crows

by theironrosebud



Series: The Four Crows [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Art, Canon-Typical Violence, Draco Malfoy Needs a Hug, F/M, First Wizarding War (mentioned), Hogwarts Fifth Year, Hufflepuff Pride, Hufflepuff/Slytherin Inter-House Relationships, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Late Night Conversations, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Resistance Art, Second War with Voldemort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:43:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26918314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theironrosebud/pseuds/theironrosebud
Summary: In which Draco Malfoy finally meets the girl who talks to the portraits on the walls.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Original Female Character(s)
Series: The Four Crows [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2045290
Comments: 1
Kudos: 19





	1. Rumours

“Elisia Crow was a troubled witch.”

“She died too soon.

“It’s a shame she left behind a baby.”

“Girl or boy?”

“I heard it’s half-blood.”

“Wasn’t she a painter?”

“I never saw any of her work.”

“Maybe it’s all locked up at Gringotts.”

“Someone told me they’d seen a Crow piece once.”

“Very dark stuff; it was all black and blue like a bruise.”

“It’s no wonder she killed herself.”

“She was a troubled witch.”


	2. They Whisper

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Year Five

Elaine Crow stood in the Prowling Passage amidst the dozens of paintings there. Curfew had been hours ago, and she was far from the basements and the warmth of her bed, but this couldn’t wait. The tip of her wand illuminated the side of her face and the colored canvas before her. The woman in the frame had jet black hair that reached her waist, and she wore a delicate white dress. There was a raven perched on her shoulder, and it clicked it’s beak and ruffled its wings urgently as its mistress spoke. 

“With the Dark Lord’s return, war is on the horizon,” the portrait hissed. 

“Kerah,” cried the raven. 

“What has The Serpent to say?” Elaine asks urgently. 

“The Manor is slithering with them,” the woman replies. 

“Do you know where they will attack?”

“Not yet,” said the painting. 

Draco Malfoy caught sight of her in the wandlight. She was wearing grey sweatpants and a black nightshirt with a coffee-colored shawl draped over it. Her black hair spilled wildly about her slim shoulders. She whispered fervently with the woman in the portrait, but he couldn’t hear the words. 

The shuffling of footsteps sounded from down the corridor. Elaine turned her head towards him. The light revealed her flushed cheeks, and her lips parted in a slight gasp. Her eyes searched for him in the darkness. 

He stepped into her circle of light. 

“It’s past curfew, you know,” Draco Malfoy crossed his arms casually. 

She had half a mind to cut the light and run from him. He was a Slytherin prefect this year and a member of Umbridge’s Inquisitorial Squad. He had caused the DA nothing but grief for weeks, and that combined with the news from the portrait sent a shiver down her spine. 

Elaine whipped her head back to the portrait to find the woman and the raven were gone. 

This didn’t escape Draco’s notice. 

“Where did she go?” He asked curiously. 

This was the most Elaine and Draco had spoken to each other since they met in First year. On September first, she’d cheerfully introduced herself, thinking he’d want to be friends with her like their mothers had been. Apparently Narcissa Malfoy had not told her son a word about her friendship with Elisia Crow, and Draco was quick to laugh in Elaine’s face at the notion of being friends with a “little bird”. The nicknames “birdy” and “Crow” stuck for weeks after, and little Elaine had been compelled ever since to be unremarkable during her time at Hogwarts. She built a friendship with Luna Lovegood instead, and the two kept kindly to themselves-- until joining the DA that is. From the looks of him now, Draco didn’t remember that night at all. Why should he? His words had changed the course of her life, but to him they were trivial, a passing moment. 

Draco looked at her with some expectation as she seemed to study his face. As if realizing he still wanted an answer to his question, she turned her gaze back to the empty picture frame, licked her lips and carefully replied: 

“She is one of a set of portraits scattered across Wizarding England. She could have gone to any one of them. She could be anywhere.” 

There were four, to be exact, and his mother possessed one of them. But she couldn’t tell Draco either of these things.

“I am sorry to have scared her off,” he said, stepping to stand beside her.

Elaine was surprised by the civility in his voice. This was Draco Malfoy. He should be hauling her into Umbridge’s office, or calling her a half-blood, or doing literally anything other than cordially discussing a painting in the dark of night. 

“It’s alright. She never strays for long. She’ll come back.” She didn’t dare take her eyes off the canvas. 

“Who is she?” he asked, eyeing the frame with a trace of suspicion. It wasn’t a painting he had ever noticed before. There were so many in this particular corridor, one was easy to overlook. 

Elaine swallowed tensely before answering, “The Raven.” 

“Do you often stray from your bed to talk to portraits?” He was smirking now. 

“Just this one,” Elaine replied softly. 

“What of the others?” Draco asked, switching his gaze to the side of her face. 

Now it was Elaine’s turn to smirk at him. “I didn’t know you took an interest in art, Mr. Malfoy.”

“When it pleases me, Miss…” he trailed off, not recalling her name. 

So he didn’t remember their first year. 

“Elaine Crow,” she said and offered him her hand to shake. Their eyes met.

He took her empty hand gently in his. “Crow…” he repeated. 

There was something familiar about the name, but it was unclear where he had gained such familiarity. 

“The others?” Draco asked, releasing her hand and looking back at the still empty portrait. 

“The Wolf, The Serpent, and Death,” Elaine explained. She waited for recognition to pass through his gaze at the mention of The Serpent, but it never came. 

Elaine privately recalled the sketch copies of the collection she had seen before: 

The Wolf depicted a barefooted child on the back of a black wolf. The child wears a tunic and leggings, but its eyes are milky white. He claps his hands gently and rocks himself on the wolf. He also buries his fingers in the wolf’s coat or smoothly pats its ears from time to time. The child’s hair is wild and black. It doesn’t speak, but when the wolf howls, it howls playfully with him.

The Serpent was also a portrait of a black-haired woman, wearing a white dress like The Raven, but she holds a bundle of flowers, the way one would hold an infant. Concealed in the wildflowers is a black serpent who winds up her arm and whispers in her ear. The Serpent is her master.

Then, there was Death. Unlike the feminine subjects of the other portraits, Death is overtly male. He is tall and has black hair. His eyes are also black, but they are smudged, like the artist didn’t like the way he looked at her. There is no sunshine in his portrait; the shadows seem to shift mindlessly around him. Sometimes he draws a hood around him, and he holds a mask in his hand at his side. Death awaits.

“They sound a bit dark for someone like you,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest again. 

“A Hufflepuff, you mean?” Elaine’s voice turned sly but only for a moment. “On the contrary, the collection is quite beautiful, even in its darkness. Anyone could see that if they knew how to look.”

Draco suddenly felt a little vulnerable under her gaze, and Elaine looked at him like she knew a secret about him. He wanted to ask how she looked, what she saw, what beauty could be found in his darkness. 

Instead he said, “You sound like you’ve seen them all.”

Her expression seemed to falter. “A long time ago.”

“Well, you’ll have to look at this one some other time,” Draco said. “If you’re caught out of bed, Filch will deduct points.”

Her eyebrows creased. “And you won’t?” she asked, confused. She was fully expecting him to deduct points from Hufflepuff at the very least. 

“Not tonight,” he said. “Consider it a trade for the lesson in portraiture.” 

The corner of her mouth threatened to quirk up, and Draco thought for a moment she might smile at him. She wrapped her shawl more tightly around her shoulders, and started walking backwards away from him. At the end of the corridor, she turned her back to him and scurried stealthily back towards the Hufflepuff dormitories. 

When she was out of sight, Draco leaned in to look at the canvas one last time. 

In the bottom corner, it was signed Crow with a curious vertical slash through the O. His eyebrows rose and then creased into a frown at the familiar sight of it. He shook his head. 

It would be almost a whole summer before Draco recognized it on the portrait in his mother’s study. And it would be even longer before he made the connection between these two portraits and the similar one in Borgin and Burkes, across from the Vanishing Cabinet. By then, it would be too late to make friends with Elaine and ask her about the paintings. It would be too late for redemption.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this as a prologue for a series, but I changed my mind. I might add more to it later. 
> 
> Please comment.


End file.
